The Darkness Within

24 - Is There an End?

A/n: Again, the chapter has torture and you are free to skip those scenes if you do not wish to read them.

"Why were you traveling with the Goddess?" Bacia asked her and she could see the wicked knife that was being held above her stomach as she was strapped to the stone table.

The fact that she could see was what let her know this was another dream. The pleasant dreams in the enchanting plain were few and far between now, her waking and sleeping hours were often now filled with torture.

With strength she didn't have when awake, she thrashed against her bindings violently. She knew this was a dream but she couldn't help but immediately react to the threat of imminent pain.

A bone-chilling laugh echoed into the shadowy room as the demon brought her knife down further, the tip of it pushing into the skin between the ribs above her heart. "How adorable, you think you can get away from me."

The knife pushed down further, threatening to push into her heart and have it shred itself on the blade. At that moment she wanted nothing more than for this to be real and the knife to push down and end this pain that she was subjected to. Her life had been a series of horrible events and she was ready for it to end, waiting even for loss of blood or spreading infection to take her from this world.

A wicked smile spread across the demon's face. "Today you will get your wish."

And then the dagger was plunged into her beating heart.

⥐

Ciara woke up with a barely-contained gasp. She had learned a while back that the moment the guards knew she was awake, then they would drag her off. Now, she was quiet at all times in the cell as if that could prevent the inevitable somehow.

The door clanged open with the usual loud, metal-scraping noise and her body already began its fearful shaking. Please not now please not now please not now, her mind played on a loop.

Instead of clanking footsteps approaching her there was the sound of something being thrown on the ground before the door closed with an echoing boom throughout the cell.

She listened as her cellmate, the mouse-like female, retrieved their food tray and made her way over to her. She wasn't sure how long she had been in this place but for some time she had attempted to refuse meals. However, the pain of her wounds and infection coupled with hunger was too much and she gave in after a while.

"It's just bread today," the mousey female informed her and she knew that was downplaying it. The bread was likely well on its way to molding but it was better than nothing to her empty stomach.

She was hand-fed individual bites of the stale bread by her cellmate before the female returned to her own space in the cold room.

⥐

She yawned as she woke up in soft green grass. As she moved to stretch, she realized that she had her arms wrapped around someone and when she opened her eyes, she found herself to be hugging Lucienne. She also then noticed that both of them had a serious deficit of clothing and immediately attempted to pull her exposed body away from the other female but the tight arms around her held her closer and she was unable to free herself.

"Little One," the golden-haired female purred and she cautiously looked up at the Goddess's face, attempting to ignore the pair of breasts a few inches from her face. A seductive smile was on the Goddess's face and she felt like a deer in headlights even though her core heated up.

"Why are we naked?" she asked, completely ignoring the growing wetness between her legs from her power-bound's continued seductive gaze.

"Do you truly not remember?" Lucienne asked and she saw a growing spark of mischief in the female's eyes.